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THE LIFE OF SIMON DE MONTFORT . EARL OF LEICESTER
CHAPTER XII.
CONCLUSION.
Strange to say, the civil war was by no means
concluded by the battle of Evesham, crushing as that defeat was for the party
that followed de Montfort. The hopeless contest was prolonged for more than two
years. Still the main interest was at an end. When Earl Simon had breathed his
last, there was no further talk of constitutional liberties. His party was
utterly disorganised, without union, without leaders,
fighting with the energy of despair for one aim alone, that of
self-preservation. The arrogance and pitiless severity of the conquerors were
in reality the salvation of the conquered. The violence of the measures taken
to stamp out the last sparks of rebellion was such that the survivors were
compelled to continue the unequal struggle, until one of the victors of
Evesham, ashamed of the part he was playing, stepped forward for their
deliverance. The character of the war thus undergoes a complete change, and has
no longer the same interest for the student of constitutional history as
before; but it may still be worthwhile to relate the course of events which led
to the final pacification, and the mournful fate which overtook the remaining
members of the family of Earl Simon.
Immediately after the victory of Evesham Henry took
the government again into his own hands, and lost no time in following up his
success. Kenilworth showed no sign of giving way, but Despenser’s widow gave up
the Tower of London, and the city itself, in which the royalists had for some
time been gaining strength, made no effort to resist its surrender. The
remnants of the baronial party had hardly yet begun to draw together again, and
Henry probably fancied that the work of restoration was complete. But instead
of healing the wounds of his exhausted country, he had already done his best to
make them incurable. Within a few weeks after the death of Earl Simon, not
satisfied by the terrible revenge taken upon the field of Evesham, Henry
summoned a council at Winchester (September 8), at which punishment was meted
out to the survivors with an unsparing hand. In one sweeping act of
condemnation, the family of de Montfort and all his partisans were outlawed,
and their property confiscated.
The wide estates which thus fell to the Crown were
employed in strengthening the hands of the royal family, and in rewarding not
only those who had been loyal to them throughout, but those too who had been
traitors to the cause for which they had fought a year before at Lewes. Prince
Edward received the goods of all the merchants of London who had opposed the
king during the late troubles. Edmund, the king’s second son, received the
earldoms of Leicester and Derby, to console him for the loss of his nominal
kingdom of Sicily. Henry of Almaine received large
estates in Nottinghamshire. The Earl of Gloucester, Roger Mortimer, and others,
were not neglected. London had to pay a heavy fine, its democratical leaders were imprisoned, its privileges at least temporarily annulled. That all
the acts of the late government, as well as the Provisions of Oxford, were repealed,
was of course a necessary consequence of the victory. The action taken by the
Court-party was in strong contrast with that of Simon de Montfort after the
battle of Lewes, when he brought upon himself the wrath of his own followers,
by setting bounds to their avarice and their lust of revenge. Nevertheless the
absence of political executions is remarkable : death, as a penalty for treason
or rebellion, was an invention of later times.
The natural result of this violent action on the part
of the king was a revival of the baronial party. Isolated bands of malcontents,
who went collectively by the name of “the Disinherited”, made their appearance
in different parts of the country, but, having no unity or organisation,
were attacked singly and dispersed before they had time to unite their forces.
Prince Edward, to whose well-directed energy and politic clemency the gradual
pacification of the country was mainly owing, made the first step towards that
end by reducing the stronghold of Dover. The Countess of Leicester, on hearing
of Edward’s escape in the previous May, had left Odiham, and made her way by Porchester and Pevensey to Dover, resolved to bar the
entrance to England against her husband’s foes. There she remained till the
news of his death showed her that further resistance was not only dangerous but
useless. She did not however seek safety in a precipitate flight. Not till the
full effect of the battle of Evesham became evident, and the decrees against
the Disinherited had been issued at Winchester, did she relax her hold on the
fortress. At length, having sent her two younger sons, Amaury and Richard,
before her, and taking with her a considerable treasure, she passed over into
France. Shortly afterwards the royalist prisoners in the castle succeeded in
making themselves masters of the keep, and held out against the garrison until
Prince Edward, who had been informed of the event, hastened from London to
their assistance. Placed thus between two fires, the garrison were soon
compelled to surrender. The fall of Dover was followed, a few months later, by
that of the other ports on the south coast. The queen and the Cardinal Legate Ottoboni were enabled to land at Dover, and having been met
at Canterbury by the king and his brother, made a sort of triumphal entry into
London.
The temporary lull was disturbed by news of fresh
outbreaks in the north and east. Simon de Montfort, the eldest surviving son of
the great earl, did not allow the grief and remorse, which he naturally felt at
the loss his own folly had caused, long to overpower him. He first of all
released his prisoners, King Richard and his second son Edmund. Then, after
pillaging the country far and near round Kenilworth, and stocking the fortress
with arms and provisions enough, it was thought, to last out a siege of seven
years, he himself, with a strong force, marched eastwards and occupied the
island of Axeholme in Lincolnshire. Tidings of the
ravages which he and his were committing in the surrounding country soon
brought Edward upon him. The natural strength of the place, increased by
artificial means, enabled him to hold out for some time; but Edward, by the aid
of bridges and a strict blockade, forced him, before end of the year, to
surrender.
A council was shortly afterwards summoned at
Northampton, where the king and the larger portion of his army lay. There Simon
presented himself, under cover of a safe conduct, and a settlement was
effected, apparently through the mediation of the legate and King
Richard. Simon agreed to give up the castle of Kenilworth, and to leave
the kingdom for an indefinite period, promising to find surety that he would
not disturb the peace. He was to receive a pension of five hundred marks a
year, until such time as tranquillity should be fully
restored. At the same time the legate, whose appearance must have reminded men
of Cardinal Gualo’s mission fifty years before,
brought the power of the Church to bear upon the delinquents. The bishops who
had supported the cause of freedom were suspended, and bidden to journey
immediately to Rome, there to purchase pardon for their misdeeds. From
Northampton the king returned to London, taking Simon with him, but the latter
having apparently had a hint that perpetual imprisonment was in store for him,
shortly afterwards made his escape, without finding the surety he had promised,
and crossed to France. He was soon followed by his brother Guy, who had been
imprisoned at Dover, but was released by his gaoler from confinement. It is possible that the royalists were glad enough to be rid
of them both, and connived at their escape.
In spite of these successes, the country was still so
disturbed that captains had to be appointed in every county to aid the sheriff
in putting down the armed bands which roved about, ravaging and destroying
wherever they went. Prince Edward first attacked one of the most noted of these
freebooters, Adam Gurdun, who with a force of eighty
knights held Farnham Castle, and carried fire and sword throughout Hampshire
and the neighbouring counties. He was surprised in
the woods near Alton, through the treachery of one of his own men, and
captured, according to one account, by Edward with his own hands. Robert Ferrars, the truest representative of feudal anarchy, the
enemy of constitutional government as well as of royal despotism, placed
himself at the head of a stronger body in his own county of Derbyshire. There
he was joined by many who had been with Simon de Montfort at Axeholme, but had rejected the compromise to which he had
given way and under the leadership of John d'Eyville preferred continuing the conflict to acquiescing in confiscation and exile.
Henry of Almaine was sent against them, and succeeded
in surprising them at Chesterfield (May 15). They were dispersed with great
loss, and the Earl of Derby himself was taken prisoner and carried to Windsor,
whither Adam Gurdun was also brought, as the
chronicler says, to “bear him company”. D'Eyville and
others cut their way through the royalists and made their escape.
But the strongest opposition was offered by Earl
Simon’s own stronghold of Kenilworth. The siege of that fortress was not
formally undertaken till June 25, 1266. The garrison had had plenty of time to
prepare, and so strongly had the castle been fortified by the military genius
of Earl Simon, and provisioned by the care of his son, that all efforts to
reduce it were vain. The garrison were summoned to surrender in accordance with
the agreement made in the spring with Simon de Montfort. But they rejected the
summons, declaring that they held the castle at the will of the Countess of
Leicester, and to her alone would they restore it. They had already given proof
that they meant to continue the struggle to desperation, by cutting off the
hand of a royal envoy whom they had taken in his passage through the district.
They showed a more chivalrous feeling when a royalist prisoner of noble birth
died of his wounds in the castle. His body was placed upon a bier, and, with
lighted candles, carried out of the castle-gates, in order that his friends
might receive it and give it honourable burial.
Humorous incidents were not wanting. The legate, who was in the royalist camp,
thought to awe the enemy into submission by the sentence of excommunication,
whereupon one of the besieged clad himself in ecclesiastical robes, and from
the castle-wall solemnly excommunicated the king and the legate and all their
followers. Enormous engines were built, and hurled stones into the castle, or
battered the walls. They were met by equally powerful machines from the inside.
The garrison, numbering, as they did, more than a thousand men, made frequent
sallies, and, meeting the besiegers on equal terms, defeated them with loss.
The state of the country was by no means favourable to a prolonged siege, and accordingly, after several months of useless effort,
the king consented to a compromise.
Three bishops and three lay barons were appointed by
the assembled magnates, and these coopted six others, two of whom
were the Earls of Gloucester and Hereford. These twelve formed a committee of
arbitration, to draw up terms of peace to which the Disinherited might
consent. The terms so arranged were called the Dictum, or Ban, of
Kenilworth. This lengthy document, consisting of forty-one articles, begins by recognising the complete re-establishment of the royal
authority, the restoration of all rights and other matters alienated from the
Crown during the late troubles, and the abolition of all promises or charters
extorted from the king or Prince Edward by Simon de Montfort and his party. On
the other hand, all ancient charters and liberties, especially those of the
Church, and all royal grants spontaneously made, were to be observed. It was
also recommended that the justices should be chosen from among honest and
unselfish men, and that no one, be his quality what it might, should seize corn
or other goods without consent of the owner. These two stipulations call to
mind similar clauses in Magna Carta. The rights thus secured are limited
enough.
Rut the greater portion of the document was naturally
taken up with the settlement of the immediate quarrel. A complete amnesty was
offered to all those in arms against the king, with certain exceptions, who
should submit within forty days, and the legate was begged to absolve all such
as should have incurred the sentence of excommunication by violating the
charters. The Disinherited were specially dealt with. The confiscation of their
estates decreed the year before was now exchanged for a system of redemption,
by which the owners could recover their property on payment of five years
rental. An exception was made in the case of the Earl of Derby, who had to pay
for seven years, and to surrender his castles. Those who had no landed property
were to forfeit half their goods; those who had neither land nor goods were to
take an oath and find surety that they would keep the peace. Special
stipulations were made in favour of those who had
been forced into the war, or were falsely accused of taking part against the
king. Twelve men were to be appointed to assess the value of confiscated
property, and to see to the execution of the provisions. In these and a number
of smaller enactments, the difficult questions of penalty
and reconciliation were arranged with scrupulous care and an evident attempt
to do justice, though a hard justice, to all. Finally, the legate was to forbid
the holding of Simon de Montfort as a saint, and to prohibit, under severe
penalties, the reports of miracles done by him, which were already being spread
about through the country. Of the sons of the late earl nothing was said, since
the king had out their affairs in the hands of the King of France.
The Dictum of Kenilworth shows a considerable advance
in point of justice and moderation on the decrees of the previous year. Still
the terms were very hard, and must have been equivalent in many cases to
confiscation. They were not accepted at once. The Dictum was published at the
end of October, but the defenders of the castle held out for several weeks
longer. As soon however as it appeared, they placed hostages in the king’s
hands, promising to surrender if not relieved by Simon de Montfort, who was
then in France, within forty days. No help came, and at last, after suffering
the extremes of cold, hunger, and wretchedness of all kinds, they
accepted the terms offered them, and gave up the place (December 20).
The war was however not yet over, and was shortly to
assume a more serious aspect than it had presented since the death of Earl
Simon. No sooner were the Disinherited suppressed in one quarter than they
reappeared in another. John d'Eyville collected the
fragments of the force that had been defeated at Chesterfield, and, attacking
Lincoln, massacred the Jews and plundered the city. Thence he marched
southwards, and, with the connivance of the inhabitants, occupied the Isle of
Ely. There, in the district where Hereward so long bade defiance to the
Conqueror, the Disinherited fortified themselves in the midst of impenetrable
marshes, and blocked all the avenues so that none could approach without their
will. As their forces increased they became bolder, and there was hardly a town
in the eastern counties which did not suffer from their raids. They even
attacked the important city of Norwich, and, meeting with no opposition, carried
off everything of value in the town. As long as the royal forces were occupied
with the siege of Kenilworth they pursued their trade unchecked, and even after
the conclusion of the siege they successfully defended themselves some time
longer. The king, who had removed to London from Kenilworth, was obliged, old
and weary as he was, to enter in the depth of winter upon a new campaign. The
Lent Parliament was summoned to meet at Bury St. Edmunds; Henry, with a large
army, took up his quarters at Cambridge, and sought to reduce the defenders of
Ely by blockade. They however showed no inclination to yield, rejected the
legates exhortation to surrender, and defeated with great loss a fleet which
had sailed up the Ouse from Lynn, Yarmouth, and other
ports to attack them. Difficulties with the clergy, who refused to pay the
tenth for three years, and other taxes which Henry demanded for the subjection
of the Disinherited, hampered the efforts of the royalists and emboldened their
enemies. Meanwhile the attention of Prince Edward was called away by
disturbances in the north. He soon succeeded, by combined activity and
clemency, in quelling them; but in his absence nothing could be done.
Matters were in this state when suddenly, without any
warning, the Earl of Gloucester took up arms and marched on London. Pretending
that he was come to support the just claims of the Disinherited, which he had
hitherto been foremost in rejecting, and to secure the fulfilment by Edward of
the oath which he had exacted from him when he escaped from Hereford, he
entered the city (April 10), and was favourably received by the democratical party, whom fear alone
had kept quiet during the past year. What was the real motive which urged the
earl to this step it is impossible to say; but one can hardly refrain from a
suspicion that he merely used the cry of justice for the Disinherited as a
pretext to cover a change of sides prompted by some personal grievance which he
had, or thought he had, against the king. Of honest effort for constitutional
reform there is hardly a trace in his whole career, except for the brief space
when he was under the influence of Earl Simon. Naturally however he at once
became the head of the malcontents, who streamed to him from all sides. John d’Eyville and other chiefs of the Disinherited left their
stronghold and joined him in London. He lost no time in fortifying the city,
and in summoning the legate to give up the Tower. The legate refusing, he began
the siege in regular form; but the fall of the fortress, which seemed imminent,
was prevented by the arrival of the king.
Prince Edward, immediately on hearing of the outbreak,
had hastened with his usual rapidity from the north, and, joining the king at
Cambridge, continued his march upon the capital. He at once released the
legate, and threw into the Tower a strong body of troops. Then he withdrew to a
short distance from the city, and waited for an opportunity. It was a curious
repetition of the events of 1264. The citizens, emboldened by the respite thus
allowed them, marched out and pillaged the neighbouring country, wrecked the palace of Westminster, and murdered many who were
suspected of royalist proclivities. Meanwhile those who had been left in the
Isle of Ely, under the leadership of Henry of Hastings, one of the defenders
of Kenilworth, renewed their ravages. The king was in sore want of money, and
could neither pay his French mercenaries, nor supply his own troops with food.
At length, when both parties had begun to weary of the fruitless struggle,
discussion took the place of war, and after some trouble, neither side being
willing to yield, a compromise was effected, through the mediation of King
Richard, Henry of Almaine, and others (June 15). The
Earl of Gloucester confessed his fault, and received pardon after taking an
oath never again to make war upon the king, under a penalty of 20,000 marks.
John d'Eyville and other chiefs received a free
pardon. The citizens of London were admitted to favour,
and no penalties were exacted. The mercenaries were dismissed, and the king
entered the city in peace.
While Henry rested from his labours in
the capital, Edward, indefatigable as ever, completed the work of pacification
by reducing the last stronghold of the Isle of Ely. Bringing together all the neighbouring population, he prevailed upon them by promises
and good words to set their services and local knowledge at his disposal. He
was thus enabled to construct causeways over the morass, by which horse and
foot could approach close to the island itself. The work was made easier by the
dryness of the season, and the connivance of Nicolas de Segrave,
who allowed the royalists to pass the outposts which he guarded. Edward then,
having made all the preparations necessary to ensure success, issued a stern
proclamation, threatening death to any one who should
offer further resistance. This measure produced the desired result. The
defenders immediately laid down their arms, and placed themselves at his mercy.
They received a free pardon, and the permission to redeem their lands according
to the Dictum of Kenilworth, and were allowed two days to depart. The conqueror
entered Ely amid the applause of the inhabitants. Only one element of disturbance
remained, Llewelyn, Prince of Wales. An army was sent to Shrewsbury, which
compelled him, towards the end of September, to sue for peace. Through the
intervention of the legate, his lands, which had been declared forfeit, were
restored on payment of a heavy fine, and peace was made.
Before the winter began the country was again, after
nearly five years of open or secret warfare, and incessant anxiety and trouble,
completely tranquil. A plentiful harvest went far to repair the damages caused
by the civil war, and universal exhaustion to some extent allayed the passions
to which it had given rise. A spirit of compromise had for some time been
gaining the upper hand. In the Parliament held at Marlborough, in November of
the same year, at which it seems probable that some representative members were
present, the Provisions of Westminster were reenacted with but slight
omissions. The only important difference was that the appointment of the high
officers of the Crown and of the sheriffs was now left in the hands of the
king. It was an omen of happy augury when the future monarch, who had recovered
his kingdom by the sword, signalised his victory by
granting of his own free will a part at least of the boon which at one time he
had striven to withhold from his people.
The first part of his work was done, and he was able,
three years later, to carry his victorious arms to the assistance of the
Christians in the Holy Land. At the head of the nobility of England he
performed the duty which was still thought to be incumbent on a Christian king,
which his father had so often undertaken, but had never been able to fulfil.
Five years of almost undisturbed tranquillity remained for Henry, and a sort of twilight happiness overspread the remainder
of his long and troubled reign. Free for a time from the restless elements
which might have again disturbed the public peace, the nation waited quietly
for the rule of one whom they had proved to be strong, and whom they believed
to be good. When the old man sank at length into his grave, the sceptre passed, for the first time since the Conquest,
without doubt or difficulty, into the hands of his successor. Twenty-five years
of prosperity and development at home, of honour and
success abroad, followed. Within thirty years after the battle of Evesham there
had grown up a younger generation, in whom the evil tendencies of feudalism
were weaker, while the instincts of law and order and constitutional government
were stronger, than in their fathers. The movement which crowned the edifice of
our constitution does not present the same contrasts of light and shade which
are so striking in the movements of 1215 and 1258, but it had a direct
connection with those earlier efforts. The great Parliament of 1295 and the
statutes of 1297 completed and confirmed that which the Great Charter had
begun, and for which Simon de Montfort had died.
It remains to trace briefly the subsequent events
which led to the extinction, within two generations, of the family of the great
earl. The countess, after her escape to France, did not neglect the interests
of her family or of those who had been her husband’s followers. In this she was
supported, to some extent at least, by her brother Richard, and by her nephew,
Prince Edward, who presented to the chancellor a list of his uncle’s adherents,
drawn up by the countess, and recommended them to mercy. She had other
advocates, perhaps more hearty, in King Louis and in her sister-in-law, the
Queen of England. It was probably through them that Henry, who no longer used
the title of “sister” in reference to the countess, so far relented as to allow
her a pension of 500l., and even to offer to receive her in England, and to
promise that justice should be done her. This pension was confirmed to her by
Edward on his return from the east, while at the same time he showed her other
signs of favour. But she did not live to reap any of
the advantages which a change of rulers might have conferred upon her. She had
taken refuge on her first arrival in France in the Dominican Convent of Montargis, and after nine years, passed under the quiet
care of the sisterhood, she died at the age of sixty, apparently some time in the year 1274.
It would have been well for her children had they had
so peaceful an end. Henry, the eldest son, fell with his father at Evesham.
Simon and Guy, after their flight from England, stayed for a short time with
their mother in France. Guy however soon tired of inactivity, and went
southwards to take service under Charles of Anjou, then engaged in the
acquisition of his kingdom of Sicily. His energy and military talents soon
raised him to a high position in that quarter, and won him the hand of
Margaret, daughter and heiress of Count Aldobrandini Rosso dell Anguillara. His elder brother followed him
to Italy somewhat later, after having stolen across to England and paid a
furtive visit to the graves of his father and brother at Evesham. The bitter
thoughts that must have gnawed at his heart as he gazed upon their
resting-places, and heard from the monks all the story of that terrible day, it
is easy enough to conjecture. The sight of the fair lands which might once have
been his but were now another’s, the destruction of all his hopes, the ruin of
his family, the brutalities perpetrated on his father’s body, his own
poverty and exile—all this may well have implanted in him a deeply-rooted
yearning for revenge, which found vent in the terrible crime that followed.
Henry of Almaine had
accompanied his cousin Edward as far as Sicily, but when the latter set sail
for Syria, in the spring of 1271, he returned northwards to take command of
Gascony, of which province he had been appointed seneschal during Edward’s
absence. On his way he stopped at Viterbo. There he
met Charles of Anjou and Philip III of France; and there too were his cousins,
Simon and Guy de Montfort. Against Henry they had no peculiar grudge; on the
contrary, he and his father had been on more friendly terms with them than the
rest of their kin. But considerations of this kind were powerless against the
blind desire of vengeance. One of the hated family was at their mercy, and the
sight of him roused their passions into fury. Watching their opportunity, they
fell upon him one morning (March 13) in a church in the town. Mass was over,
and he had remained behind to pray alone, when the brothers entered with drawn
swords and cries of murderer and traitor. Henry rose from his knees and fled to
the altar, but his enemies followed him and stabbed him as he clung to the holy
place and cried in vain for mercy. They even dragged him to and fro in horrible mockery of the way in which their father’s
body had been insulted at Evesham. Then they rode off and succeeded in making
good their escape.
The universal horror inspired by the deed nevertheless
produced for some time little results. The efforts made to bring the
murderers to justice were ineffectual, and caused a suspicion that Charles of
Anjou was concerned in their safety. The Church interfered with a tardy
excommunication of the offenders, but nothing serious was done till Edwards
return from the Holy Land. In the interval Simon had died, but Guy and his
father-in-law were brought to trial. The latter cleared himself. Guy was
outlawed, and, after submitting, to the Pope, was imprisoned for ten years. He
was then released by Pope Martin IV, who needed his services as a soldier. Five
years later he was captured by the Sicilians at sea, and thrown into a dungeon,
whence he never emerged alive. He left only daughters, of whom nothing seems to
be known.
What Amauri de Montfort had been doing
during this time we are not told, but he appears to have returned to England as
chaplain—for he was in orders—to the Bishop of Chester about the time of
Edward’s accession. He must however have left the country again soon after, for
he was captured with his sister, while accompanying her to Wales. Some years
later he was set free, and passed into Italy, where he turned soldier and
subsequently died. What became of Richard de Montfort we do not know.
The fate of Eleanor, Earl Simon’s only daughter, is
better known. The old connexion between the two
families had doubtless brought about her betrothal to Llewelyn, Prince of
Wales. For some time however the necessity of submission to England prevented
Llewelyn from endangering peace by a marriage which Edward was likely to
oppose. When war became imminent, and repeated summons to Court showed Llewelyn
that the English king was intent on a more than formal homage, there was no
longer anything to be gained by temporising. Eleanor
was then called to add the strength of her name to the cause of Welch
independence, but in passing over to Wales was captured in the Bristol Channel
by ships which Edward had ordered to watch for her (1276). During the war
that broke out immediately after, Eleanor was placed in honourable confinement, but no sooner was it over than the generous conqueror granted the
wishes of his late foe, and with his own hand gave him his bride (October
1278). Her wedded happiness was but short-lived. She died in childbirth in June
1282, before the war, which the folly and treachery of David had renewed, had
ended so disastrously for Wales. It was well for her that she was saved from
the trouble to come, and of her little daughter was, when the war was over, brought
to England with the children of her uncle David, and well cared for by order of
the king. She was however not allowed to marry, but remained a nun in the
convent of Sempringham till her death. In her
perished the last known scion of the family of the great earl, Simon de
Montfort.
APPENDIX
MIRACLES OF SIMON DE MONTFORT.
The following are a few of the miracles, over two
hundred in number, which are related to have been performed by Simon de
Montfort after death. They are printed by Mr. Halliwell at the end of his
edition of the “Narratio de duobus bellis apud Lewes et Evesham, &c.,” published for the Camden Society. These
miracles are spoken of in the Dictum of Kenilworth, when the Earl had been dead
just a year, and are alluded to in several contemporary MSS., e.g. the
Chronicle of Evesham and the Brute Chronicle, quoted by Mr. Halliwell on his
preface. The list of miracles was preceded in the MS. by an account of the
battle of Evesham, now obliterated, and was compiled by a monk of Evesham. I
have thought that they might be found interesting as specimens of the superstition
of the time, and have accordingly translated a few of them, as follows:
1. The Countess of Gloucester had a palfrey that had
been broken-winded for two years. In returning from Eveham to Tewkesbury, the horse having drunk of the Earl’s Well and having had its
head and face washed in the water, recovered. . . . Of this the Countess and
all her company are witnesses.
2. A sick woman of Elmley sent her daughter to the Earl’s Well to fetch water. In returning she met the
servants of the castle, who asked her what she had in the pitcher. She answered
that it was new beer from Evesham, and they said, “Nay, but it is water from
the Earl’s Well”. But when they had drawn some forth, they found it as the girl
had said, and so they let her go. And when she came to the sick woman, it was
again changed into water, and the sick woman having drunk thereof, was healed.
3. It is to be remembered of the hand of Simon, that
the bearer of it was journeying by a certain church, and, hearing the bell toll
for mass, entered in and prayed; and when the priest stood up to elevate the
body of Christ, the hand moved and stood upright, and adored Jesus, as it was
wont while yet alive.
4. William, surnamed Child, had a son who was sick to
death, at which William was sore grieved. By chance a certain Friar Preacher,
an old companion of his, came to him, and seeing his grief, asked him if he had
ever been at enmity with Earl Simon. And he said, “Yes, for he deprived me of
my goods”. And the other answered, “Ask pardon of the martyr, and thou shalt
recover thy child”. Meanwhile the child died, and the father in great grief
threw himself upon his bed and slept. And he saw in a dream Christ descend from
heaven and touch him, saying, “Whatever thou askest in the name of my Earl, shall be given thee”. And he rose in haste and measured
the boy, and he opened his eyes. Of this Clement of London and the father of
the dead boy are witnesses.
5. Stephen Hulle and others,
citizens of Hereford, relate a wonderful thing about Philip, chaplain of Brentley,
who reviled the Earl, and said, “If the Earl be a saint, as they say, may the
devil break my neck, or some miracle happen before I come home”. And as he
asked, so it came to pass. For in returning home he saw a hare, and pursuing it
fell from his horse. Of this the whole city of Hereford bear witness.
THE END.
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